What's the deal? Really about the shooting of Mark Duggan? What was he doing that caused him to be shot?

Who is Duggan and why was he so popular, and why didn't he heed police when they asked him to stop his car? Is he a revered gangster?

Did you ever see such a messed up situation in your whole life, son?

It was part of an ongoing police investigation into black people carrying firearms. Given that such people are want to shoot said firearms, it's not unreasonable for the police to also be duly armed. Likely it was a special unit that is trained and given clearance to shoot black people should they be found in possession of firearms.

It's because of this that the citizens of the UK can sleep safely at night, and need only kill a black person should one be found burglarising their own home and castle.

Yeah that's true. I should know really, my mate's brother works for them. ANYWAY, yes - not regular police and generally going to be tooled up for an operation.

edit - also the rioters appear to be very much predominantly white. Hm!

Possibly entirely unrelated, but very unusual... there were (at least) three dozen police in Croydon town centre this evening.

No signs of rioting or property damage or whatever, though both the shopping centres seemed to be closing early, so maybe something happened/planned inside either/both of those.